'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2': James Gunn Says 'Look for Clues' to Sylvester Stallone's 'Important' Character

Aside from a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment in a sizzle reel shown at Comic-Con last summer, Sylvester Stallone’s role in the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 has been shrouded in mystery. Directed James Gunn swung by the Yahoo Studios this week for a Facebook Live session to talk about both his new film The Belko Experiment (in theaters now) and the Guardians sequel (out May 5), and he dropped some tantalizing tidbits about Stallone’s top-secret role.

Asked by Yahoo Movies’ Kevin Polowy if he could divulge any information on Stallone’s character, Gunn initially demurred. “I could, but I choose not to,” he said, before offering a bit more.

“I think will people find out very, very soon,” he continued. “Look for clues and you will find out the character Sylvester Stallone plays.

“He is fantastic in the movie. It’s a very important part of the Marvel cosmic universe.”

While we haven’t been able to put the clues together ourselves, fans have been speculating that Stallone may be the super-powered Nova or possibly a member of Youndu’s motley space pirates known as the Ravagers.

The filmmaker admitted he completely geeked out on set, working with Stallone and Kurt Russell, who co-stars in the film as the father of Chris Pratt’s Peter Quill, Ego the Living Planet.

“When I was a little kid I ran around the backyard pretending I was Snake Plissken or Johnny Rambo. Now I’m working with Kurt Russell and Sylvester Stallone who were icons to me as a child,” said Gunn. “I worked with Kurt for 80 days, now he’s ‘Kurt.’ But Sly, we worked for a few days on set… The guy cracks me up. He’s a very, very funny guy and we have a good time together.”

Sylvester Stallone as Rambo (TriStar)

Gunn also divulged that Stallone had just come in to re-record some dialogue for his role. You can watch the full exchange above.

As he has been making the rounds to promote The Belkin Experiment, a film he wrote and produced about a group of office workers forced to kill each other, Gunn has revealed precious few details about Stallone’s involvement. However, earlier this week, he did let slip on The Adam Carolla Show podcast that Stallone’s character is somehow tied to one played by Michael Rosenbaum (best known as Lex Luthor on ABC’s long-running Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman).

We do have a couple of characters who are very important to the Marvel Universe who are going to make their debut in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 which people don’t know about… Sylvester Stallone plays one of these characters… my friend Michael Rosenbaum also has a pretty decent movie in the role as well and it sort of works in tandem with Sly’s character.

Sound off in the comments if you have any idea how to decipher Gunn’s clues.